A chance listing on the Public Catalogue
Foundation Art UK, for an oil on canvas painting (35.8 x 30.7 cm)
said to be of Russia’s last Empress, Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna,
when she was Princess Alix of Hesse (1872-1918) led me to
investigate this extraordinary artwork further. Because in the many
years I had researched on Princess Alix, I had never seen anything
like it. It does not resemble…
In the British Library five letters from
Princess Alix of Hesse, later Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna of
Russia (1872-1918) are preserved. Initially, I thought there were
seven letters of hers at the British Library, but further research
has enabled me to establish that these…
In the summer of 1894, the Tsarevich
Nicholas came to England as a guest of Queen Victoria, first
staying for a brief few days with his fiancée, Princess Alix of
Hesse, at Walton-on-Thames before continuing to Windsor Castle.
This was a blissful period for a young couple…
When Tsarevich Nicholas visited Windsor
as a guest of Queen Victoria in the summer of 1894, he spent a
brief time with his fiancée, Princess Alix of Hesse, at Marlborough
House, the London residence of the Prince and Princess of Wales on
the Mall. As Nicholas wrote with glee to his mother, Empress Marie
Feodorovna, that following his short visit to Sandringham, the
Norfolk residence of the Prince…
In the summer of 1894, Tsarevich Nicholas
of Russia came to stay at Walton-on-Thames, in the house which his
fiancée, Princess Alix of Hesse’s eldest sister, Victoria, Princess
Louis of Battenberg and her husband, Prince Louis of Battenberg had
rented. They would stay in…
On 29 May 1894, Tsarevich Nicholas of
Russia wrote to his mother, Empress Marie Feodorovna, that he could
see the sea from the room in which he was writing, in the imperial
palace of Peterhof and that he had ‘such a longing for the yacht
and want to fly there to join my…
During the time they were at Coburg,
Princess Alix of Hesse and Tsarevich Nicholas of Russia became
engaged, a date they would treasure for the rest of their lives – 8
April 1894. Whilst they were in Coburg, visited the theatre and saw
an operetta of which they would become affectionately fond, Carl
Zeller’s popular piece in three acts, Der Vogelhändler [The
Birdseller]. Both recorded…
In May 1894, Princess Alix of Hesse
undertook a cure in the fashionable Yorkshire spa town of Harrogate
for sciatica. She had become engaged to Tsarevich Nicholas of
Russia at Coburg the previous month. Whilst she stayed at
Harrogate, she regularly corresponded with her…
Princess Alix of Hesse, later Tsarina
Alexandra Feodorovna, visited the Yorkshire spa town of Harrogate
in 1894 to take a cure for sciatica, during which time she became
godmother to the Allen twins, born in the house where she was
staying, to her landlady, Mrs Allen. These…
In the German spa town of Bad Nauheim in
Hesse, hangs a present – by tradition – from Imperial Russia. It is
to be found within the solemnly beautiful church, the
Reinhardskirche, in the old town quarter, built between 1732/33.
Like many baroque churches whose outer exterior is plain and its
interior lavish with decorative detail, the simplicity of its
sacred architecture from the…
